


For awhile

by pr_scatterbrain



Category: Hockey RPF
Genre: Implied Incest, Implied Relationships, Lockout, M/M, Multi, New York City, Pre-Poly
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-03-21
Updated: 2013-03-21
Packaged: 2017-12-06 00:03:48
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,646
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/729407
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pr_scatterbrain/pseuds/pr_scatterbrain
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After the season ends – after Jordan’s career with the Penguin’s ends – Jordan doesn’t quite know what to do with himself. Normally, he spends the summer with Eric, sleeping on his couch and eating him out of house and home. But the summer is something outside of Jordan's real life. The summer doesn't exist when Jordan is a Penguin. </p><p>But Jordan isn’t a Penguin anymore. </p><p>Somehow he ends up going to stay with Marc.</p>
            </blockquote>





	For awhile

**Author's Note:**

> I blame this on Lexi, Rae, and the hockey emails of doom they send me. 
> 
> n.b. This is set in a universe where no one is married. (But Marc Staal is as awesome as ever).

 

 

After the season ends – after Jordan’s career with the Penguin’s ends – Jordan doesn’t quite know what to do with himself. Normally, he spends the summer with Eric, sleeping on his couch and eating him out of house and home. But the summer is something outside of Jordan's real life. The summer doesn't exist when Jordan is a Penguin. But Jordan isn’t a Penguin anymore.

This year, knowing that he's going to Carolina instead of Pittsburgh when the summer ends, the thought of spending the offseason with Eric is too much. Somehow Jordan ends up going to stay with Marc in NYC. It isn’t planned. It isn’t even something Jordan particularly has any desire to do. But it’s where he ends up.

They've never been all that close. Sure, they're family, but Eric was always so much to Jordan. But, it's - it's a lot to think about playing with Eric next season, being on the same team and in the same place.

Marc knows okay. He has always known how Jordan is about Eric.

It's something he doesn't talk about. Something no one else seems to pick up on. But Marc's always has been better at reading between the lines than his brothers.

Their mother is pleased when she finds out about Jordan spending the summer in NYC. She likes the idea of Jordan staying with Marc, keeping him company. Family is important.

It's weird though. Marc lives in a tiny apartment.

"Real estate," Marc says as he shows Jordan in, as if that explains why someone with a three point something million dollar contract lives in a place where he has to store most of his hockey gear in the teams equipment room.

But Jordan shouldn't really talk. He's homeless. He's house in Pittsburgh is almost sold (paperwork pending), and he's yet to talk to estate agents in Raleigh.

It's been a while since he's lived in such small quarters. Neither of them are small guys. They always seem to be bumping into each other, knocking elbows and knees and Marc is Jordan's brother. But Jordan doesn't know him. In the morning, Jordan gets up early and sits outside on Marc's ratty balcony and calls Eric and tells him about how Marc is so New York. It's bullshit, of course, because Marc is Marc and thus is the most un-New York person ever to live in New York, but it makes Eric laugh and Jordan's spent most of his life trying to make Eric laugh.

"You coming to visit me soon?" Eric asks.

"And miss Marc taking me to listen to indie pop bands you’ve never heard of in Williamsburg?" Jordan scoffs.

"Okay, okay. I get how that is a better offer than helping me landscape my garden."

Jordan snorts. Eric doesn't landscape. Eric mows the lawn and calls it day.

Eric laughs. "Whatever. I'll get Skinner to help me instead."

"Skinner's still in town?"

Jeff is never in town. That's the point of being sixteen and the Justin Bieber of hockey.

"Yeah," Eric says absently. "He wanted to work with my trainer to help improve his endurance."

And - that's a good one, for a teenager. Jordan has to give him that.

Jordan pointedly doesn't say anything. Inside the apartment, he hears Marc turn on the shower.

"Hey, I have to go. Marc's up."

"Talk to you later," Eric says and of course he will.

 

 

(Eric never asks to speak to Marc. No one talks about that).

 

 

Marc overhears everything. He's apartment has paper thin walls.

He wonders when Jordan will catch on.

Probably later, rather than sooner, Marc muses as they eat breakfast in front of Marc’s flat screen, watching random breakfast news shows. But that isn’t anything new.

Afterwards they go and train. The gym is mostly empty (everyone else is at work), but Marc's trainer's voice fills it; shouting corrections and encouragement. At lunchtime, Marc takes Jordan to a local café. They sit outside on a too small table. Marc likes to eat outside. NYC is like that. People live their lives in the open. They just sleep, shut away in tiny spaces. Jordan hasn't caught on to that either. They fumble through conversations about their training sessions and conditioning and Marc isn't waiting. He's never waited for either Eric or Jordan to talk about whatever the hell is going on between them. But he's there. He's always there.

 

 

In the evenings, Marc makes himself put on a freshly ironed shirt and cologne. Jordan wants to go clubbing. Or whatever the NYC equivalent is of a Pittsburgh night on the town. Marc doesn’t know if he wants to know what that would involve, so instead Marc takes him downtown to see a friend of a friends gig. It’s a nice night. Traffic is bad, but Marc doesn’t feel impatient. When they arrive, Jordan disappears in the crush of people crowded around the bar. Marc heads the opposite direction towards the stage where his friends are waiting.

On the whole, they are amused by Jordan.

"So, that's your brother," Jillian says after she meets him.

For a while she and Marc dated. It didn't last. Few things do. They're still friends though. NYC is a small place. She's perceptive and he's never been good at holding grudges. They make better friends than anything else.

"That's one of my brothers," he nods.

"Interesting," she comments.

Not so much, he thinks. But he doesn't say that. Together they stand outside the venue; she smokes and he leans his head against the brick wall. The muffled baseline rumbles through the walls; Marc closes his eyes for just a second and listens. The night is young; so is he. Jillian shuffles a little, her heels scrapping against the concrete as she puts out her cigarette.

“Ready to go back in?” she asks.

“Not so much,” he tells her.

It makes her smile. “Too bad, kiddo.”

It isn’t. Not really.

Inside, she pulls him to the front of the crowd and tucks herself against his side as the crowd sways and moves. In the corner of Marc’s eye, he catches a flash of gold as the stage lights falls on Jordan’s hair. Standing a few metres away, he looks familiar and unfamiliar at the same time. Marc looks away.

 

 

A few hours later Marc pours Jordan into a taxi.

They miss their training session the following morning.

 

 

Jeff comes to NYC. Some of his friends are there. It's a sponsorship thing. Young faces of the NHL, or whatever. Or just, whatever.

He's young. But that will pass.

When they all meet up, his face is red from the heat of the club and his jeans look like they are new. They look expensive too. Maybe he's trying to impress them. Maybe he's just trying to get Jordan to notice him.

Eric always had shit taste; Marc is older than Jared and Jordan, he can see it. (He can say it too).

Jeff's buddies have already set up a tab. The nights just begun but Steven Stamkos and PK Subban already look drunk. They are loud, abrasive presences in the booth. They're nice guys. But they don't look like it now as they lean over the waitress who is trying to take the tables drink order. Jeff laughs at them and adds a round of shots to the drinks order before sitting down next to Jordan.

The two of them are going to be teammates. They might even be line mates.

"Better or worse than Sid?" Marc asks when Jeff is distracted by Michael Del Zotto and Alex Pietrangelo arriving.

Jordan makes a face.

Marc laughs.

 

 

Jordan and Sidney actually get on quite well. Neither of them are particularly socially adept, but they're good friends with each other. Or friendly towards each other.

They aren't talking too much at the moment.

The Penguins offered Jordan a ten year contract. They wanted him to start and end his career with them. But the thing is, Jordan wanted to be a Hurricane. Sidney's never even thought about being anything but a Penguin.

"It's for the best," Jordan says, once.

Marc knows that.

Without Jordan, the Pens were able to get Brandon Sutter and Brian Dumoulin. They'll also, not that anyone is acknowledging it, be able to afford Geno with ease.

Sid will come around sooner or later. Unlike Marc's brothers, Sidney has always been remarkably clear about what he wants when it comes to Geno.

"Yeah," Jordan nods. "I know."

"At least you're not a Flyer."

Jordan snorts. "Fuck. Yeah, it could always be worse."

 

 

Jeff is only meant to be in NYC for a few days. He stays longer though.

"I want to get to know you," he tells Jordan, when they meet up for drinks at another club and sit in another VIP section where no one knows who they are or what they’re doing taking up space.

Jordan feels like laughing. Who says things like that? Who is actually that earnest in real life?

Jeff's eyes are wide and his collar is crocked and his shirt is sticking to his chest.

He looks like a kid. He's a kid. He's a teenager.

They end up making out in the bathroom. Jeff's mouth is hot and he rushes; he knocks his teeth on Jordan's, and accidentally bites Jordan's tongue. Of course Jeff goes for the buttons on Jordan's jeans to fast too. Immediately falling to his knees like it's sexy rather than something that's going to fuck with his knees. Jordan swears and Jeff fumbling with Jordan's cock, forgetting to cover his teeth and it isn't any good objectively, but it's over quickly so there is that.

Jordan ends up taking Jeff home. No. Not home. To Marc's.

"Sleep it off," Jordan says, dumping Jeff on the couch.

Jeff's face falls.

Jordan goes to his room so he doesn't have to look at it. Him. Whatever. Fuck.

 

 

In the morning Eric calls.

Jordan doesn't answer.

 

 

Objectively, Jeff is a good guest. When he gets up he folds the blanket and puts it away and doesn't use all the hot water.

Marc wonders if he is meant to like the kid who is fucking two of his brothers. It's easier to let Jeff tag along to training.

Jeff’s in ok condition. Not great. But not horrible. It’s pretty much what Marc would expect for a player Jeff age and with his talent. In the gym, he keeps up, but doesn’t set the pace. He isn't lazy, but he doesn't approach pre-season training with any real sense of purpose or determination.  In a few years maybe he’ll be different. It’s hard to know.

Marc doesn't remember being as young as Jeff. Even when Marc was a teenager, he doesn't think he was as young as Jeff. It's strange how hung up Eric is on him. Jordan too. Marc has seen how Jordan spits and hisses and acts towards Jeff. Marc's heard Jordan's slights. But Jordan's always has been jealous of anyone who took up Eric's time. He might have been one of four, but he never learnt to share. Even Jared's better than Jordan, and Jared's stuck in the minors pretending he doesn't care how far away he is from the NHL.

 

 

Jeff and Jordan start fucking before the week is out. It's predictable.

 

 

Jordan falls for Jeff. That isn't.

 

 

Jordan has never loved anyone as much as he loves Eric. Jeff is rude and demanding and naive and doesn't get Jordan's jokes. The music on Jeff's ipod is crap too.

Jordan still falls for him. He lets it become another secret hiding underneath his skin.

 

 

Around them, the summer is drawing to a close. The days are growing shorter and one after the other, the nights are easily wasted. The threat of a lockout makes Jordan restless. Jeff goes home mid-September. Goes back to Eric. Jordan sends him off with finger shaped bruises all over him. He's not fooling anyone.

Sean Avery thinks it's hilarious and he doesn't even know half of it. (But then again, who knows the whole story?)

"You good old Canadian boys," he says, when Marc attends the launch of his cover for _Dazed and Confused_ magazine.

Marc shrugs. "Don't look at me."

Sean laughs. "No one looks at you. That's how you get away with such shit."

"True," Marc allows. He was never the troublemaker like Jordan, or the leader like Eric, or even the late bloomer like Jared.

Marc likes Sean. Jordan doesn't get it. But Jordan's best friend is Eric, and apart from that the only people Jordan considers close friend are Sidney the kid Crosby and Geno 'I love animals' Malkin. Marc doesn't think Geno speaks fluent English. They just enjoy laughing at Sidney's misfortunes and drinking too much.

 

 

"When are you coming to Carolina?" Eric asks when he calls.

The lockout is now into its third week and is dragging on and on.

According to Sidney, it could end any day now. But Jordan is smart enough to know why Sidney is saying that.

"I don't know. Soon, I guess."

Eric is quiet.

Jordan isn't sure why he is still in NYC. The summer is over. He never meant to stay so long.

He knows how Marc takes his coffee. He knows Marc's friends and his ex's and how when he's lazy he will eat his toast standing over the sink so he doesn't have to wash any dishes afterwards. Jordan's never really known Marc, but now they know each other.

Marc isn't like Eric.

Marc doesn't really feel like Jordan's brother. A few times Marc's friends have confused them – mistaking one for the other. Jordan doesn't know why. They aren't anything alike.

They are brothers though.

"Come home," Eric says.

And - Jordan knows what Eric is asking. Or maybe Jordan just knows what he wants Eric to be asking. Either way the answer is the same.

"Okay."

"Okay?" Eric asks.

"Yeah," Jordan tells him.

 

 

Summer never lasts. Jordan never remembers that.

 

 

After Jordan ends the call, he books his flight online. Marc gets out of the shower in time to stop Jordan charging the flight to Marc's credit card.

“Count it as a belated birthday present,” Jordan tries.

Marc snorts. “Buy it yourself. Don’t be a cheapskate.”

Jordan is one, anyway, downgrading himself from first class to coach. Marc knows he’ll regret it twenty minutes into the flight, but there are worse things to regret than leg cramps. On the balcony, Marc eats burnt toast and checks his mobile for missed calls. There are a few. But there always are. He returns a few and by the time he finishes catching up with Henrik about the informal Ranger practices he and Ryan Callahan are organising, Jordan is making nose about doing some strength training before he leaves.

Maybe it should be something; should mean something. But what? Marc doesn’t know.

In the evening, he helps Jordan take his bags downstairs and pack them into the waiting taxi.

"Now you won't have to fight anyone for the bathroom in the morning," Jordan tells him. “All the hot water will be yours for the taking.”

Marc grins. All his family are shit at goodbyes. He thinks about telling Jordan to keep an eye on Eric. Eric will be keeping an eye in Jordan - but Eric's always looked after Jordan. That's the crux of it, really; the heart of them. Marc isn’t sure what Jeff is, or where he fits in. But he does. That is evident from the events of this summer even if nothing else is.

"Don't be a stranger," Marc settles on, eventually. It isn't perfect, but it's true. He doesn't want Jordan to just be someone Marc sits next to at a family get together.

Jordan rolls his eyes.

And that is how it ends.

(And that’s how it begins).

 

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> Find/follow me on [tumblr](http://www.pr-scatterbrain.tumblr.com) if you want <3


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